


Dad’s Gonna Kill Me

by helloelliot



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Child Abuse, Depression, F/M, John Winchester’s A+ parenting, M/M, Mild Self Harm, Past Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-07
Updated: 2020-10-20
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:09:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 4,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26332426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helloelliot/pseuds/helloelliot
Summary: Something is up with Dean, and Sam is starting to notice. He’s not sleeping well, he’s drinking more, and he’s gotten quiet. Could it all be something to do with his past? And if so, is it too late for him to be saved?
Relationships: Dean Winchester/Castiel
Comments: 9
Kudos: 65





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The title is based on the song “Dad’s Gonna Kill Me” by Richard Thompson, which can be heard here: https://youtu.be/G-yySxecVAg
> 
> The timeline is extremely vague! Bobby is alive and so I guess pre-Season 8 but I reserve the right to mess with the timeline. There will be eventual Dean/Cas. Please do not read if you are triggered by descriptions of/references to child abuse. I will try to add specific warnings at the beginning of each chapter. Please tell me if I need to tag any other warnings - I’m pretty new to writing, so I don’t always know what’s expected.
> 
> Enjoy and thanks for reading!

Dean woke, soaked in sweat, muscles tensed. Ready for a fight, like he always was. The adrenaline was still coursing through his veins and it took him a minute to take some breaths and lower his heart rate. He grabbed last night’s bottle from the nightstand and took a long swig.

His nightmares were getting more and more frequent. And too vivid. Sometimes he didn’t know what was real when he awoke. Leaving the job behind at the end of the day was one thing. He’d learned to compartmentalize. That was how he survived. But the memories lingered in his subconscious and they had to come out sometime. The alcohol helped dull the edges, but it couldn’t quite erase them.

Sam stirred on the adjacent bed. “Dean? You ok?”

“I’m good,” Dean said. “Go back to sleep. We got an early start tomorrow.”

He would never share these dreams with Sam. What was the point? The kid wanted to remember his father as a good person. A noble person. He didn’t know the half of the beatings and the verbal slings Dean had endured. Dean had been shielding Sam from the pain of that betrayal from when they were kids.

Whenever he felt this rage at his father rise up inside him, another voice answered him. “Don’t you think you deserved it?” The words were John’s, but over the years the voice had been diluted. It was part John, part Alastair, and worst of all, part his own. It was the voice that rebuked him when he tried to get close to someone. The voice that told him he didn’t deserve the love of his brother, the love of Castiel. That he would be alone forever.

Stop it, he berated himself silently. Just shut the fuck up. Living in the past won’t help anything now. He was afraid to go back to sleep now. Afraid he’d go straight back into the dream. He grabbed a pen off the nightstand instead, and a sheet of hotel stationary. He had to exorcize the memory, to take its power away. He’d been doing this for a while, with a pen and paper. Some therapist had told him about this technique. He was supposed to write down the dream with as much detail as possible and then read the dream back to himself, as repetition. But most days it was all he could do to get the words on paper without his hands shaking bad enough. He wrote in the present tense, like the therapist told him.

_I’m 9 or 10 years old. It’s late - or early. We’re in another crappy hotel. Sam is sleeping. Dad’s out. I’m supposed to be researching. But I’m so tired, and hungry. I can barely keep my eyes open. I fall asleep. When I wake up he’s there, and he’s livid. He’s not yelling loud, because he doesn’t want to wake Sammy. But the venom in his voice...I know I’m in trouble. Dad’s gonna kill me._


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> trigger warning - physical violence, child abuse

Sam usually woke up earlier than Dean when they were on the road. But lately, he couldn’t remember a time when he’d seen Dean actually sleep. Dean had been drinking more too. Of course for Dean, drinking was basically a sport, so it was hard to say how much was too much. But something was off. And he’d started paying attention. 

That morning, Dean was staring at the television, blankly. It was playing home shopping network. Sam arched his eyebrow. “Uh, Dean? Are you interested in purchasing...” Sam glanced at the caption on the TV. “...the Petite Princess Doll in Petal Pink?”

Dean didn’t look up. “Actually I’m more partial to the Petunia Purple.”

“Right,” said Sam. “Well, we got an email from Bobby. Possible shapeshifter thing. Are you ready to go?”

Dean sighed and clicked off the TV. “Gimme 10 minutes, just gonna splash some water on my face.”

While Dean showered, Sam got their bags together and started cleaning up the room a bit to make the housekeeper’s life a little easier. He swept last night’s takeout containers and beer cans into the trash, then went to Dean’s nightstand to clear the empty bottles and bits of garbage. 

Then he saw the hotel stationery. With Dean’s writing on it.

At first glance he thought it was something leftover from a hunt. Then he saw the word “Dad” a few sentences down the page.

He glanced at the door. The water was still running, and Dean was making occasional splashing sounds. Should he read it? Or would Dean be pissed? He glanced nervously back at the pages.

Then he saw his name. He took the paper in his hand and started to read. 

_It’s too late. Dad saw that I was asleep. His hands reach for my collar and he literally drags me out of the hotel room, closing the door behind him._

_“What the hell are you thinking Dean?” he fumes. “This is a HUNT. You can’t just CLOCK OUT on this job. And worse, you left Sammy unprotected. I was counting on you to watch over him.”_

_I try to think of excuses. Something to say to make him stop being angry. But it’s really no use. When he gets like this, there’s no cooling him off._

_“I’m sorry Sir,” I say. I see his lip curl slightly._

_“I’m sorry,” he parrots back at me. “I’m sorry. Well sorry won’t save your brother.”_

_“Dad...I was tired. I couldn’t have been asleep more than five minutes, honest.”_

_“Don’t you make excuses, boy,” he snarls._

_“I’m not—”_

_I then feel his fist connect with my jaw. It momentarily stuns me into silence. Then, against my will, my eyes fill with tears. My face is hot and throbbing. The tears spill onto my cheeks and burn in the raw spot where his fist split the skin. I feel ashamed. I am angry—a little bit at him, but mostly at myself. Because I could have avoided this if I’d been more careful. If I’d been more disciplined._

_I see the expression on his face and I try to read it, try to predict what he will do next, and how I can counter it. It’s become a game of strategy, even though I’m still so young. I have to figure out the things that make him mad and how to avoid them. I know he hates it when I cry. He thinks crying is weakness. So I try to stop. I will myself to STOP. CRYING. NOW._

_“Clean yourself up, for fuck’s sake,” he says. I can’t tell if there’s a hint of regret in his voice mixed in with the disgust. “And don’t let your brother see you like this.”_

_I grab the door and pull it open and scurry into the bathroom. I shut the door behind me. I run the water in the sink. I stare at my stupid face in the mirror. Red and blotchy and starting to bruise. I’ll have to come up with an excuse for this one. And I better make it a good one. I know that if Sam finds out, it will only mean more trouble for both of us._

Sam stopped suddenly when he heard the water shut on in the bathroom. He frantically arranged the papers into the order he found them in, and hastily moved away from the nightstand, pretending to pick up some garbage from the floor.

Dean strolled out of the bathroom and his face is like marble. Impassible, unreadable. “Jeez Sam, you have a future as a maid.” He walked to the side table and Sam watched out of the corner of his eye as he folded the stack of paper in half and stuffed it into his inner jacket pocket. “Come on. I’ll buy you breakfast,” Dean said.

Sam nodded and tried to smile. But he could barely suppress the sick feeling in his chest. As Dean turned his back and hoisted up a duffel bag, Sam’s face fell. What else had Dean been holding inside for all these years?


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> trigger warning - physical violence, child abuse

Dean had been driving for about 60 miles when he realized Sam was quiet. Unusually quiet. He was often contemplative, but the furrow in his brows looked a little deeper than usual. He was doing his concerned face. Dean had come to loathe this face. He hated talking about himself, about his feelings. He hated burdening his brother with his crap. 

Dean reached over and put in a Bob Seger cassette. 

“Dean, can we hold off on the music?” Sam asked.

“Why? Hold off on Bob Seger? Bob Seger waits for no man, Sammy.”

The first song that played was “‘Til it Shines.” One of their Dad’s favorites. Sam tried to listen for some kind of new meaning in the words. 

_“Take away my inhibitions / Take away my solitude...”_

Sam had thought about what to say. Whether to say anything at all. He could wait and see what else Dean wrote. But that felt underhanded. Wrong. Like he was keeping secrets. Even though he wasn’t the one with the secrets right now. 

“Dean...I have to tell you something.”

Dean tried to make a joke out of it, as usual. “That you’re a Coldplay fan? Yeah, I know, and it hurts me deep down in my soul.”

Sam sighed. “I read your little diary, Dean.”

Just for a moment he saw a flicker of something cross Dean’s eyes. Fear? Anger? Vulnerability? He wasn’t sure. “You shouldn’t have read that,” Dean said. “It wasn’t for you.”

“Well, I did read it. And I just wanted to say...I’m so sorry. I didn’t know Dad was doing that to you.”

Dean let out a short laugh, like a bark. He kept his eyes on the road. “Well, Sammy, Dad did a lot worse than that. Turns out there ain’t no heroes in this world.”

“What do you mean worse than that? What’s worse than hitting a little kid for falling asleep?”

Dean shrugged. “Just...worse.”

The word hung in the air in between them and Sam felt a chill down his spine. Those two words...what could they mean? For a moment, Bob Seger’s voice was the only thing that broke the silence: _”Storm the walls around this prison / Leave the inmates, free the guards / Deal me up another future / From some brand new deck of cards...”_

Dean broke the silence. “He was a mean drunk. You knew that. He wasn’t in his right mind. You didn’t know because neither of us wanted you to know. And I still don’t. It’s none of your damn business Sam.”

Sam was starting to get angry too. “How is it not my business? You’re my brother. He was my father. He was abusing you. And you still followed him, all those years.”

“I’m not gonna discuss this with you Sam, okay? Period. End of story.”

“Well you have to talk to someone. Bobby, or Cas-“

“They can NEVER KNOW,” said Dean. “I’m not gonna tell them and neither will you.”

“But—“

“Look Sammy, this is something I gotta work through on my own. Writing those pages, it’s like...it’s like therapy. I saw this therapist chick a couple years ago. She taught me this thing, this repetition technique. So I write the shit down in as much detail as possible. I’m working on it. By myself. I don’t need Bobby, or Cas. I don’t need YOU.”

The last word was so cold that Sam felt as if he’d been slapped. He slunk back against the passenger window and stared at the road going by outside. Bob Seger kept crooning like nothing was different. Like Sam’s whole world wasn’t crumbling underneath him. 

_”Take the chip off of my shoulder / Smooth out all the lines / Take me out among the rustling pines / ‘Til it shines / Oh 'til it shines.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song “‘Til It Shines” can be heard here - one of my favorites https://youtu.be/s9jM8_EevgM


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> trigger warning - self harm

It was late when they pulled into Sioux Falls. He and Sam had ridden in silence for the last few hours or so, save for a few monosyllabic grunts about what highway to take or whether they needed to stop and get gas. Dean was exhausted when they finally arrived at Bobby’s house. Bobby took one look at the boys and their silent, grim expressions, and instantly knew something was up.

“What the hell is up with you two?” Bobby asked.

“Nothing,” said Dean.

“Sure, nothing. Sam’s eyebrows are practically on his hairline. Something’s up, so would ya mind cutting the bullshit and clueing me in so we can skip the whole dysfunctional bit?”

Dean sighed and flopped out on Bobby’s couch. “Sam’s just pissed I don’t wanna let him read my diary, that’s all.” He tried to make his tone sound light and flippant. He wasn’t sure if he succeeded. 

Bobby looked at Sam for confirmation. 

“It’s private, Bobby. We’re fine,” Sam said. Sam was a terrible liar. Always had been. But in that moment, Dean felt immense gratitude for Sam for dropping the issue...at least for now. 

“Well you boys have about 10 hours until we need to get on this hunt, so you better work it out tonight. How’s about a beer?”

“That’s the first good idea I’ve heard all day,” grumbled Dean. 

——

Hours later, Dean was still on Bobby’s couch, watching TV, and had switched from beer to liquor. The whole house was quiet, except for the rumbling snores coming from Bobby’s master bedroom. Sam was asleep too in the guest room. Dean usually slept on the couch, but he couldn’t bear to turn off the light and just continue to toss and turn.

Thinking back on the conversation in the car with Sam, Dean burned with humiliation. The horror he’d felt when he realized Sam had read what he wrote stung him deep. He had to be strong. He was always the strong one. He couldn’t be that careless again. 

He stood up, staggering a bit from the liquor, and pulled the handwritten pages from his jacket. Then he went to Bobby’s wood-burning stove and opened the metal door. He stared at the orange and red flames dancing inside, and hesitated for just a moment, before shoving the pages in. He watched them shrivel and turn brown at the edges and he felt relief. 

It was no use, after all. He’d been desperate, but this exposure therapy didn’t seem to be doing a goddamn thing. As far as he could tell, he was only getting worse. This whole “you have to go through it to get past it” theory was crap. He’d already been through it once. Remembering made it worse. It was like pressing a bruise, or itching a scab until it opened and started bleeding again. Plus, the worse that John had done...well, Dean wasn’t sure he could handle writing it down. 

He poked at the stove with an iron poker until the pages were burnt beyond recognition. He felt almost an unbearable emptiness rising up in him, and he couldn’t explain why. 

He tried to remember the last time he’d felt anything apart from anger, or humiliation. He came up empty. 

Still staring at the fire, he spoke aloud, barely above a whisper: “I just wanna be the person I used to be. I just want to hunt, and sleep, and feel like a person.” His eyes began to tear up. “Please, just...help.” He had no idea what kind of help he needed. It was a cry to the universe, the cry of a wounded animal, or a little kid. He knew he was alone.

He lifted the poker out of the stove and stared at the tip, still glowing. And before he knew what he was doing, he was pressing the tip of the poker against his inner forearm. 

The white hot burning brought him back to himself. “Dammit,” he cursed. He walked to the sink and ran cold water over the burn. That was a stupid thing to do. He didn’t even know why he’d done it. 

He kept it under water for a while then grabbed a relatively clean looking rag from the sink, soaked it in cold water, and wrapped it once around his arm.

“Dean.”

Dean about jumped out of his skin. He spun around to see Cas standing behind him in Bobby’s kitchen.

“Cas, what the hell...what are you doing here, you scared me half to death.”

The angel looked sheepish. “Well...I heard your prayer.”

“I wasn’t praying to you,” Dean muttered.

Castiel ignored that comment. “You’re injured,” he observed.

“I’m fine,” said Dean.

“Let me,” said Cas. He touched a finger lightly to Dean’s arm and the sting went away. Dean removed the washrag and tossed it into the sink.

“Thanks for the appearance and all, Cas, but I’m sure you got more important things to do. So you can go now.”

“Dean, I’m not going anywhere,” said Cas. Dean felt the angel’s blue eyes boring into him and he turned his head away. He hated that Cas was so attuned to him that he could hear Dean’s most private moments. He hated looking weak in front of the angel.

Cas grabbed Dean by the arm. “Your thoughts,” Castiel continued unbidden. “You’re in pain. Anguish. You can’t expect me to ignore that.” 

Dean said nothing.

“Look at me, Dean.” 

Dean met those blue eyes for the briefest of moments and then looked away. He pulled his arm free of Cas’ grasp and stumbled back into the living room. Cas followed him. “And you’re drunk. Too drunk.”

Dean sat back on the couch and put his head in his hands. Cas stood by the arm of the sofa and continued to stare at him. “Dammit Cas, leave me alone.” 

“No,” said Castiel. “You’re going to tell me what’s going on. Or I’ll have no choice but to wake Sam and Bobby.”

Dean sighed heavily. “Fine,” he said. “Fine, okay? But not here. Let’s go outside.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: past abuse, childhood sexual abuse, rape.

Dean brushed his fingers through his hair. “Cas...I’m fine.”

“Dean, you keep saying that like you think I will believe it. I heard you. Just now. And I saw your arm. What happened?”

“An accident.”

Castiel just stared at him. 

Dean knew he wasn’t fooling anyone. He just really didn’t want to have this conversation. 

Castiel sighed. He took Dean’s face in both of his hands and turned it toward him, so that he could look into Dean’s eyes. Dean flinched. Castiel could tell he wanted to run. 

“Dean,” Castiel said, and his voice was grave. “You need to tell me everything. Now. I know when you’re lying. And you know I have other ways to find out the truth. If you want me to leave you alone, then I need to hear the truth. All of it.”

Dean’s eyes began to fill with tears. He was frustrated. He knew that Cas wouldn’t let up until he had his answer. Dean’s shoulders slumped. He nodded once, then shook Castiel’s hands off his face. 

“Can you make sure Sam and Bobby won’t wake up?” Dean asked

“I can.”

“Fine. Then do that, and meet me in the Impala.” 

Moments later, Cas was in the passenger seat. Dean was in the driver’s seat, as usual. They sat for a moment, the hum of the engine the only sound. 

Dean began, and his voice was flat. 

“I’ve worked hard to make sure Sam thinks that our father was a good man,” said Dean. His voice was flat and expressionless, like he was reading off a script. “I’ve protected him. But the truth is my dad was a bastard. A real fucking sadist. When he was drinking, it was bad. And when he was sober, it wasn’t much better. Sam was too young to remember the worst of it. And I want it to stay like that. You can’t tell him anything I’m about to tell you.”

Castiel nodded. “This stays between us.”

Dean cleared his throat. “So a few years ago I saw this psychologist. It was part of a job, at first. But shrinks have this way of getting in your head.”

“So I’ve heard,“ said Castiel.

“I told her about these nightmares I’d been having, how I couldn’t sleep well, how I was drinking more. She told me that I could be whole again. If I could wade through my ‘trauma’...or so she called it...I could be a better brother and a better hunter. So I started to write about my childhood. Just a little bit here and there. None of the really bad stuff. I thought of it like a kind of purification. Like a cleansing ritual.”

Castiel was silent. He worried that if he interrupted, Dean might clam up again.

“Anyway, there were distractions. I went to hell, we saved the world, yadda yadda. But recently it’s just...it’s been really bad. And the nightmares started to come back. But twice as bad. So I started writing again. I was supposed to write this stuff over and over again, pretend I was there, so I could get desensitized to it. I don’t know if it works. Maybe I haven’t given it a real shot. But then today, Sammy found some pages I wrote and...I never wanted him to know about this.”

“About what, Dean?”

Dean looked down at his hands. “My Dad beat the shit out of me. Regularly. I had scars for years, I explained them away as hunting injuries. And Sam, he never knew. Dad never hit him. I never complained when he was beating me, or after. I tried not to give him the satisfaction.”

“But the worst part is that even though I knew my Dad was a piece of shit, I still wanted him to love me. I wanted him to be proud of me. Sometimes we’d have days together, just him and me. We’d leave Sammy at Bobby’s or at some motel to work a dangerous job, and then it was just him and me. And in those moments, god help me, I just wanted to be good. He would buy us a good dinner, and we’d watch movies together. And I wanted to be a good son. So I let him do whatever he wanted to me.”

Castiel felt his heart turn cold. “What do you mean, whatever he wanted?”

Dean blinked. There were tears in his eyes. “Don’t make me say it, man. I can’t say it.”

Castiel was quiet for a second. “Would it be easier if I just...looked into your mind?” He held a hand up. 

Dean nodded.

Castiel put a hand to Dean’s temple. He wasn’t sure whether he would be able to see this if Dean didn’t want him to. But sometimes, because of the bond they shared, Castiel could reach into Dean’s thoughts and just...see.

_He saw a motel room. John Winchester, with Dean, no older than thirteen or fourteen. He saw John holding Dean, not like a father holds a child, but like a lover. He saw John’s hands moving over Dean’s smaller body, and he saw the expression on John’s face. Hungry, and guilty._

_“Dean,” John said in the vision, “you know I love you, right? I’m sorry that I’m so hard on you. I want to make it up to you. I want to make you feel good.”_

_Young Dean nodded. The look in his eyes...Castiel recognized it. Dead. Like he wasn’t even there. Cas had seen this look in Dean’s eyes before. He looked...utterly broken._

_Cas could watch all of this, but it was like a movie. He couldn’t intervene. He watched helplessly as the older man, smelling of whiskey, put his hands down his son’s jeans. He could see the elder Winchester was aroused. The scene flickered. He saw Dean, naked and shivering, while his father stood over him and pressed his body against him. Pressed into him. Cas heard moaning. He heard screaming - the young Dean screaming and crying. He heard John say “Hush, Dean. Be a good boy.” The screams and the sobbing stopped. Younger Dean’s face was blank apart from winces of pain. He saw the snot and tears running down the boy’s face - just a child. He was just a child. Castiel had seen enough._

Cas snapped out of Dean’s memories and recoiled. It had been no more than a couple of seconds, but he knew that Dean had been living that moment too. Dean’s face was the mirror image of the little boy’s. Pained. With eyes that seemed far away. And tears were spilling out of Dean’s eyes like a fountain. The levee had broken and Dean was sobbing silently. 

“He...abused you.”

“Yes.” Dean’s voice was deep and husky.

“He...raped you?”

Dean swallowed and took a shuddering breath. “Yes.” 

Castiel was dumbstruck. He felt furious. This was the man that Heaven had called righteous? This monster who terrorized children?

“Dean...I am so sorry,” said Castiel. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Don’t be sorry,” said Dean. “I let it happen. I knew what he wanted from me when we went off by ourselves. I even...I even convinced myself I liked it. Because I thought he loved me. But he only loved what I could do for him.”

Castiel reached out to touch Dean’s shoulder but Dean shrank away from him like a caged animal. Castiel took his hand back instantly. 

“How long did this go on?” Castiel asked.

Dean shrugged. “I don’t even remember how old I was when the beatings started. Still in elementary school. The...the other stuff...I was a little older. And it stopped when Sammy left for college. I don’t know why.”

The two sat in silence for another moment. Castiel cursed himself. If he was a better angel, a better friend, he would have something more to say. 

Dean was the one who broke the silence. “I understand if you don’t want to hang around someone like me,” he said.

“What are you talking about?”

“Someone like me. Evil. Sinful.” 

Cas spoke in a firm tone then. “Dean, look at me. You did not do anything wrong. You were a child. Wanting love, that is not a crime. None of this is on you. Do you understand?”

Dean nodded, but his eyes remained the same. Cold. Distant. Cas knew he didn’t believe it.

Cas said, “If I could save you from what happened, I would. In a second. I am so, so sorry.”

“You said that already,” said Dean, gruffly. Then suddenly, Dean looked at him, fearful. “You can’t tell Sam. Or Bobby. This stays between us. You have to swear.”

“I swear,” said Cas. “But if I can make a suggestion - I think if you were honest with Sam, he would understand.”

“I can’t tell him,” said Dean. “I can’t, and you won’t either. I swear to god if you tell him, I will hunt your feathery ass down. Do you understand me?”

The Dean Winchester bravado was back again. Castiel sighed. “I won’t tell.”

Secrets. Always secrets with the Winchesters. 

The two of them stayed in the car for a while longer. Just looking out at the night sky. Eventually, Dean fell asleep. Castiel could tell he was exhausted, as much from the telling of the tale as from anything else.

Castiel watched him sleep. He would not betray Dean, he decided. How could he betray him when he’d already been so broken by this world? He needed someone to believe in. Someone to trust.

Cas would be that for him. He was too late to save Dean. But he would do what he could to heal Dean’s heart.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a short partial chapter, to be continued!

When Dean woke up, he was alone in the Impala. For a moment he was disoriented. Then he remembered the conversation with Cas and felt a wave of shame wash over him. What the hell had he done. He’d let out a secret that he’d meant to bury forever. For his own sake, as much as for anyone else’s. Cas was gone. He’d taken off sometime in the middle of the night. 

He stretched and groaned. His neck from the tension in his shoulders. He’d Dean checked his watch - it was 6:30 am. Good. He’d woken up with the sun, early enough to sneak back in before Bobby and Sam got up. 

—

When Sam walked into the kitchen, Dean was already awake and dressed in his best FBI suit, a cup of coffee and a donut in his hand. “Coffee’s on,” he said, pointing to the fresh pot. Dean sounded weirdly cheerful. Trying to act like everything was normal, obviously. 

“Thanks,” said Sam. “I can’t believe you’re up this early. And so, chipper.”

“Caffeine is a helluva drug,” said Dean.

Sam poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down at Bobby’s kitchen table. “So...are we talking to each other again?”

Sam saw a nearly imperceptible shadow cross Dean’s face, but then the cheery expression was back. “Hard to hunt a shapeshifter without talking, Sammy. We got work to do.”

“Just like that?”

Dean sighed. “Look, I’m sorry I got a little snappy with you. And I’d be more than happy to hash all of this out later. But right now, we got a shapeshifter on the loose and we gotta get cracking. Is Bobby up?”

“Yeah, he just got out of the shower.”

“Gotta wash off the 7 layers of crud huh? Alright. Finish your breakfast, grab the old man, and let’s get this show on the road.”

Dean whistled to himself. Sam sat there stunned for a moment. Part of him wanted to yell at Dean to stop the charade. But he didn’t want to make his brother angry again - not anymore than he already had, anyway. He wasn’t gonna let this go, but maybe he could let it lie for a little while.


End file.
